


We Did It All In the Dance

by Anonymous_1701



Category: Fred Astaire - Fandom, Ginger Rogers - Fandom, Old Hollywood, golden age hollywood - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Golden Age Hollywood, Old Hollywood - Freeform, soul mates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 08:27:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29222421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anonymous_1701/pseuds/Anonymous_1701
Summary: Fred Astaire was an amazing dancer, a good actor and a perfect gentleman who enjoyed secrets and double entrendes.What if there’s more to his songs that we realize?  This story is set during the filming of "The Barkleys of Broadway" in 1949.
Relationships: Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers, Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers
Kudos: 8





	We Did It All In the Dance

Fred sat in his director’s chair on the set of his current movie, “The Barkleys of Broadway”. Beside him sat his former co-star and on-again off-again lover, Ginger Rogers. They were supposed to be looking over their lines for their next scene, but Fred had just finished reminiscing about all the fun they used to have while they made their other nine movies together, back in the 30’s. He’d been chattering at her now for fifteen minutes non-stop, gushing about how much fun he was having making this movie, too, 10 years later. Finally, he quieted down. Ginger looked back to her script and tried to focus. With Fred next to her again, though, it was difficult. He was always her best distraction. 

He’d been her best distraction for half of her life, now. She was thirty eight, going on thirty nine and she’d met him when she was all of nineteen years old. They’d fallen hard for each other, became lovers and both were left broken hearted when she moved to Los Angeles six months later with a movie-contract in hand. Two years later, they’d met again when Fred relocated to the west coast. Within two movies of seven on their initial contract, they’d picked up where they’d left off, rekindling their romance, and acknowledging their love. Since then, they had negotiated the few speed bumps along the way – aka a couple of marriages, a couple of children - and stuck it out. Now, they were settled into their own separate lives off set; while on set, they were very obviously a couple. It was their time together.

With a devilish side glance at her, Fred began to tap his fingers on the armrest.

Pretty soon, his tapping distracted Ginger. 

“Why are you tapping ‘Night & Day’ at me?” she asked, putting away her script. She recognized that he was doing his best to engage her attention again. 

“Oh, you noticed?” he asked guilelessly, his pretty hazel eyes twinkling at her in his big, heart shaped head. His body, still slim like a boy after all these years, was folded into the chair and looked ready to burst into action at any moment. 

“Yeah. What gives?”

Right then, a curious stillness occurred on the soundstage and a collective groan went up amongst the crew. Charles Walters, their director, could be heard shouting from another part of the stage and they realized that the air conditioning had gone out. 

Fred and Ginger shared a glance of amusement, remembering another AC unit that had broken on the day of their big fight on “Top Hat” years before. 

They closed their scripts and put them into the chair’s pockets. She smoothed down the pretty outfit that she was wearing, a lovely grey pinstripe suit unlike anything she’d worn back in the day on those old dance movies. She loved how it fit, though she was no longer the little pixie twig that she’d been back then, all of a hundred and five pounds soaking wet most of the time. Now she had a woman’s figure and a lot more self-confidence, not that that had ever been lacking. Two decades in the entertainment industry had settled her, as much as her ranch up in Oregon grounded her between films. She still turned heads when she walked down the street.

“Well, looks like this new studio has the same AC issues as the old studio.” Ginger looked around at the crew scurrying this way and that. ‘Barkleys’ was shooting at MGM, a first for the pair, as all of their old movies had been made at RKO Studios. 

“Hey, now we’ve got some time. It’ll be hours before it’s fixed. Come with me.”

Fred jumped up from his chair and grabbed Ginger’s hand, dragging her along behind him.

Finding Charles along the way, he let the director know that they’d be in his dressing room, but not to interrupt them for at least an hour. Charles, a huge fan of theirs from his youth, nodded politely and declined to wonder what went on in their dressing rooms. 

Curious now, Ginger followed along behind him, their fingers still intertwined. Entering his room, they locked the door behind themselves. She took a seat on his comfortable couch, while he sat on the chair at his makeup table across from her. 

“Alright, what gives?” she said again, curiosity eating at her. Fred had that look in his eye, slightly manic, in her opinion, that usually meant he was cooking up mischief and couldn’t wait to involve her in it.

“I never did get to tell you this on ‘Shall We Dance’” he began, but she interrupted him before he went further.

“That was ten years ago, Fred!”

He hushed her and continued, “As I was saying, I never got to tell you this because, well, you know, George and all…”

His voice trailed off. His best friend, George Gershwin had died after writing all the music for that film. He hadn’t lived long enough to actually see it, having an inoperable brain tumor that was detected far too late and claimed his life far too early. It had nearly broken Fred. They had been friends since their early teens, while George worked on Tin Pan Alley and Fred on the Vaudeville circuit. They’d hoped and dreamed of the day when they’d work together in Hollywood, and it had happened right before his unexpected death. For a long time afterwards, Fred had been heartbroken.

Ginger understood this keenly. She had also been friends with George. In fact, it was he who had introduced them to each other, on the set of her Broadway play, “Girl Crazy”, in 1930. Fred had been hired to give her dance lessons and they’d fallen instantly, passionately in love. She did understand how Fred could have been distracted from – whatever it was – by George’s death. She nodded.

“… and then it just never seemed like the right time to reveal it to you.” He looked around at his dressing room at MGM, different than his old room at RKO, and at Ginger, also different from their time at the old studio. When Judy Garland had been unable to make the film, Fred had jumped at the unexpected opportunity to ask Ginger to work on the film. She’d been up in Oregon at her ranch and had gladly returned to Los Angeles for a few months. Getting to work with him one more time had been a lovely experience. 

“And now it’s the right time?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

He nodded, more solemnly this time.

“So… when we first began making films, people kept asking me why I never kissed you on film.”

“Um, Phyllis?” Ginger interrupted again. Fred’s wife was definitely one reason. 

“Shhh, yes. But no.” He hushed her and put a finger on her lips. “Here’s the thing. I kept answering that question by saying that ‘we did it all in the dance’, right?”

“Right? I know you say that ad nauseum.”

“Hmmm. Anyway, we really did do it all in the dance.”

Now she was truly perplexed. She raised an eyebrow at him.

“Come on, Rogers, you’re usually faster than this,” Fred teased her. Near silent laughter shook his slim frame. 

“Fred, those dances were a decade ago and more! How am I supposed to remember every little detail of what happened?”

“Oh, but that’s the best part, baby! These aren’t little details; these are BIG details!”

Now she truly was stumped. He jumped up from his chair and held his hands out to the side, wide. His hazel eyes flashed, and his eyebrows nearly disappeared up his forehead into his thin hairline and slick toupee. She didn’t know where he got the energy, but he’d always had enough for five men. 

“Okay, spill it.”

“So, I decided to create something for you. The story of our romance, written into the songs in our movies.” 

Ginger was shocked into silence as he began to expound upon his hidden agenda.

“Rio didn’t really count. I was brand new and we weren’t together, well except for that one night, and I had no idea what I was doing,” he began, “but by the time ‘The Gay Divorcee’ rolled around, I’d concocted my plan. “Night & Day” was the first of my songs about you, and not necessarily your character.”

Her jaw dropped open. He’d hidden dialog about their relationship throughout their songs? She was flabbergasted. She felt all the blood leave her face and then rush back up, leaving her flushed. Of course he had. He loved playing games like this. James Cagney had once said that Fred had a little of the hoodlum in him, and she knew just how accurate that assessment was. She loved the way that his sneaky little mind worked.

“Frederick Austerlitz,” she scolded gently, and liked the way his full given name flowed off her tongue, “How long have you been planning this?”

“Oh, it occurred to me after I signed our initial seven-movie contract in 1934, that I might try something… just a game within a game, so to speak.”

She could only stare at him in consternation and delight.

“So, ‘Night & Day’ on ‘The Gay Divorcee’ was all about our infatuation with one another, though we hadn’t yet gotten back together. It was all about how much I longed for you. I helped Cole Porter write the lyrics, but he got credit. Of course, some times a song is just a song, as Freud never said, but I did slip some things in there, over the years.” 

He began to sing, and his soft tenor voice filled the dressing room.

“Night and day, you are the one  
Only you beneath the moon and under the sun  
Whether near to me or far  
It's no matter darling where you are  
I think of you  
Night and day, day and night why is it so  
That this longing for you follows wherever I go  
In the roaring traffic's boom  
In the silence of my lonely room  
I think of you  
Night and day  
Under the hide of me  
There's an oh such a hungry yearning burning inside of me  
And this torment won't be through  
Until you let me spend my life making  
Love to you day and night, Night and Day…”

Ginger was intrigued. She kicked off her shoes and tucked her legs up under her on the couch and got comfortable. Everyone had always said that his songs were so romantic, and so amazing. She’d loved them when he sang them to her, but it was just work, right? She’d doubted then and now she had confirmation. Her heart beat a mile a minute.  


Fred continued.  


“Then, along came ‘Roberta’ and it was all about us getting together. I was ecstatic, euphoric, and enchanted once again. This time I called up Dorothy Fields, and we collaborated on the lyrics. Of course Jerome went along with the whole idea, too.”  


She was the one who was enchanted, now. He was always a surprise, coming up with amazing adventures for the two of them, but this type of planning was not his usual strength. A shiver ran down her spine. Catching her eye, he sang.  


“Lovely to look at,  
Delightful to know and heaven to kiss  
A combination like this,  
Is quite my most impossible scheme come true,  
Imagine finding a dream like you  
You're lovely to look at,  
It's thrilling to hold you terribly tight  
For we're together, the moon is new,  
And oh, it's lovely to look at you tonight…”

“Of course,” he went on, “we changed the lyrics slightly from impossible scheme to impossible dream etcetera, but the idea was there. You were lovely to look at, delightful to know and truly heaven to kiss… and the ‘Smoke Gets In Your Eyes’ dance was off the charts amazing. Do you know the whole saying?” 

She shook her head, utterly entranced. 

“It goes like this. When there’s fire in your heart, smoke gets in your eyes.”

His voice trailed off, and he was blushing. After all these years, he could still blush with her. He reached out and took her hand. Squeezing her fingers gently, he continued.

“Then along came ‘Top Hat’. All that drama and trauma, oh my. Well, we survived it, with our passion and love intact. It truly was heaven, those years. This time, Irving Berlin was my partner in crime.”

Irving had been a frequent guest on their stages for years and was a personal friend of both Fred and Ginger. He had moved from New York to Los Angeles specifically to write music for Fred to sing. That he’d been a collaborator was no big surprise.

“Heaven... I'm in heaven,  
And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak.  
And I seem to find the happiness I seek,  
When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek…”

His eyes filled up with tears and his voice choked up. He went silent for a moment, lost in memory. Those had also been difficult years, when his wife had gotten pregnant, and they’d both wondered if they should – or could – call the whole thing off. 

“And then reality set in. I wasn’t sure if we were going to make it. Maybe that would be the end of it all, and I wanted just one more song to commemorate the whole thing. That’s where ‘Let’s Face the Music and Dance’ came in, on “Follow the Fleet”, and Irving came through again just spectacularly. It was right before Freddie Jr. was born. Do you remember?” 

Tears pricked her eyes. Of course she remembered. That had been a difficult time, and she’d also feared losing him forever. She’d been despondent, and he had been at one of his lowest points. The birth of his son should have been one of the happiest times in his life, and it was for the child’s sake alone, but it was also when they’d been strained nearly to the breaking point. 

There had been a lot of analysis of that song and dance. For years, people had wondered why Fred wrote that particular play within a play. He’d written about two people on the verge of suicide and how they saved each other. Most assumed, after some head scratching, that it was about giving hope during the Great Depression, like the previous number ‘Pick Yourself Up’. However, the actual song lyrics did not fit for either of the characters in the play. It was a mystery. Now, she knew the truth.

Fred moved to the couch next to her, still holding her hand. He began gently rubbing his thumb over her fingers, as he loved to do. His voice quavered a bit, then steadied.

“There may be trouble ahead  
But while there's music and moonlight  
And love and romance  
Let's face the music and dance

Before the fiddlers have fled  
Before they ask us to pay the bill  
And while we still have the chance  
Let's face the music and dance

Soon, we'll be without the moon  
Humming a different tune, and then  
There may be teardrops to shed  
So while there's moonlight and music  
And love and romance  
Let's face the music and dance  
Dance!  
Let's face the music and dance...”

His voice trailed off and they were both lost in thought for a while, remembering those hard days and lonely nights, interrupted by stolen moments of passion. He cleared his throat.  


“And then ‘Swing Time’ came along, and I thought you were lost to me.”

She couldn’t look at him. They had come so close to calling the whole thing off. She’d even tried to distract herself by dating the director of the film, George Stevens, a truly nice man who had nearly been enough. Of course, only Fred was enough in the end. 

“I knew we were going to hit this rough spot, or that you’d leave me eventually. As soon as I got the script, I called up Dorothy, and we worked it all out. She’s an angel and the soul of discretion. I poured out my broken heart to her,” he admitted, “Fortunately, the lyrics fit in exactly right in the film, since Lucky and Penny had their own issues.”

“Someday, when I'm awfully low  
When the world is cold  
I will feel a glow just thinking of you  
And the way you look tonight  
You're lovely, with your smile so warm  
And your cheeks so soft  
There is nothing for me but to love you  
And the way you look tonight  
With each word your tenderness grows  
Tearing my fears apart  
And that laugh that wrinkles your nose  
Touches my foolish heart  
Yes, you're lovely, never, ever change  
Keep that breathless charm  
Won't you please arrange it?  
'Cause I love you  
Just the way you look tonight…”

“Oh, god,” Ginger reached for a tissue on the end table next to the couch. “Fred, you’re killing me here. Seriously? The next time I see Dorothy, I’m going to give her a huge hug.” 

She could remember every note that Fred had played on the piano as he sang to her during the silly hair washing scene that had caused so much trouble. She’d wondered how he could stay focused during the many takes and interruptions to this scene. That he’d had a whole entirely different agenda boggled her mind. 

“And then George happened on ‘Shall We Dance’ and we got some real amazing stuff from him.” Fred’s eyes lit up at the remembrance of his best friend. “We had made it through the bottleneck, where everything that had conspired against us came together and put us in the squeeze. But we made it, and George was going to celebrate that, you betcha. Ira helped with this one, of course.”

Ira was George’s brother, and the lyricist of the musical duo. They had worked so closely together, that she swore sometimes that they made her believe in telepathy. They had been an amazing team, writing some of their best songs, at least in their minds, and in hers. ‘Shall We Dance’ had been bittersweet, though, as George had unexpectedly died of an undiagnosed brain tumor right before the movie premiered. He’d never seen it. It had left them both devastated.

“George and Ira and I wrote this one in their dining room over dinner one night.”

Ginger crinkled her nose at him. “Wait, you all sat around and wrote a song for me?”

Fred laughed. “It was even better because it was YOUR song, singing to me. And that’s just how I wanted it. You wanting me. And you came through.”

Clearing his throat and swallowing the lump that thinking of George always produced, he wrapped his arm around her waist, pulling her closer to him on the couch. He began, singing the words quietly into her ear as she rested her head on his shoulder.

“They laughed at me wanting you  
Said, I was reaching for the moon  
But oh, you came through  
Now they'll have to change their tune

They all said, we never could be happy  
They laughed at us and how  
But ho, ho, ho  
Who's got the last laugh now?”

“But of course, other men vied for your attention, out in the real world where I was unable to compete for you! I knew I had you, but it still galled me. Irving came up with this, and I loved it. ‘Carefree’ was all the better for it, and that dance. Hoo boy! That was a good one. I can’t believe you were so light, light as a feather.”

“Must you dance every dance  
With the same fortunate man?  
You have danced with him since the music began  
Won't you change partners and dance with me?  
Must you dance quite so close  
With your lips touching his face?  
Can't you see I'm longing to be in his place?  
Won't you change partners and dance with me?  
Ask him to sit this one out  
While you're alone  
I'll tell the waiter to tell him  
He's wanted on the telephone  
You've been locked in his arms  
Ever since heaven knows when  
Won't you change partners and then  
You may never want to change partners again…”

Fred snuggled her deeper into his arm and held her close. She was near tears, realizing that he’d spent YEARS hiding these little gems into their production numbers, just for her. For the thousandth time, she wished that circumstances were different and that they could be together, in public. But they both knew that the chances of that happening were slim to none. Fred’s two delightful children, thirteen and seven now, were the chains that bound him to his wife, and Ginger was unwilling to sit home alone and be at his beck and call as only his mistress. She loved life too much to let it all go past waiting on him. 

“And now, Fred?”

He was also struggling with emotions held in check, his own frustration, shame, and love intertwined for decades now. 

“Now, for the second time, I’ll sing George’s song to you and me. You suggested it, even, back on the table read when we were struggling to figure out the dances. We’ll do “They Can’t Take That Away From Me” and I’ll mean every word of it when I sing it to you. I think we both know that we’ll be together, always, in one form or another. Right?” 

Suddenly anxious, he turned her in his arms to look at him. Her sapphire blue eyes sparkled at him, those same amazing blue eyes that he’d fallen for, hook, line, and sinker, nearly twenty years ago.  
“Right.”  


In that moment, they knew that even if marriage eluded them, they would always have one another, and no one could take that away from them.

The way she haunted his dreams, indeed. She always had and always would. He pressed his lips to her forehead gently, remembering all their good times together. Every line in the song was taken from a real life incident, which of course George knew all about. In the softest voice imaginable, Fred sang the words, and he meant every one of them.

“The way you wear your hat  
The way you sip your tea  
The memory of all that  
No, no, they can't take that away from me  
The way your smile just beams  
The way you sing off key  
The way you haunt my dreams  
No, no, they can't take that away from me  
We may never, never meet again  
On the bumpy road to love  
Still I'll always, always keep the memory of  
The way you hold your knife  
The way we danced till three  
The way you've changed my life  
Oh no, they can't take that away from me  
No, they can't take that away from me  
The way you hold your knife  
The way we danced till three  
The way you changed my life  
No, no, they can't take that away from me  
No, they can't take that away from me…”

They snuggled down onto the couch, Fred on the bottom and Ginger on top, entwining their legs in a comfortable pattern.

“I'm speechless. You're amazing.”

Fred went silent, and she could feel him smiling as his lips touched her forehead. As their breathing settled into one pattern, she mind was going a mile a minute. 

The songs written for their movies were always popular. They usually made the Top Ten Songs of the Year, consistently; some of them were even nominated for Academy Awards. The one’s he’d just sang to her were some of the best of the bunch. People all over the world sang them, and popular musical artists covered them all the time. 

If these were Fred’s secret songs to her, that meant that all over the world, and probably for years to come, people would unknowingly be singing about his hopes, wishes and dreams for the two of them.  


She might not get to spend her life with him in a traditional manner, but he’d just set their love story to music and dance, and it would be enshrined for decades to come. He’d created a long song, with many verses hidden within as many movies, that wove through their film legacy. It was a tale of their hidden life together. He really had done it all in the dance. It sent a shiver down her spine.

She might not have his ring on her finger, but she had this and it would last far longer than either of them lived.

His arms held her tight and she sighed in contentment, snuggled into him. As long as memory served, no one could ever take that away from them.

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't get this out of my head. While researching my current fiction, "Without the Moon", the words of "Let's Face the Music and Dance" just make no sense. Fred created a play within a play, and a song. He could have written anything. He wrote about two people at low points in their lives, who save each other. However, the actual lyrics do not match the characters in the play. The words only make sense if it's Fred writing to Ginger. Then, I wondered if he'd done the same throughout their musicals together and this story took form. Enjoy!


End file.
